


Redux

by EgonH



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Horror, Magic Realism, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-12-09
Packaged: 2020-06-27 18:20:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19796431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EgonH/pseuds/EgonH
Summary: The main point that he conceded and that she couldn’t understand was that at their very hearts they were animals. He was a beast, predatory and dark, crashing through waves of impulses and holding back and back and back. He supposed that made her the lamb.He went back and the coffee was still warm in the cup





	1. Chapter 1

He went back and the coffee was still warm in the cup.

~

The main point that he conceded and that she couldn’t understand was that at their very hearts they were animals. He was a beast, predatory and dark, crashing through waves of impulses and holding back and back and back. He supposed that made her the lamb.

His bachelor suite was exactly that. It was basic and sparse - white washed walls and aging accents. His things lingering here and there. Things he could no longer stir up interest for. Instead, his mind couldn’t help but produce ghostly additions. Sam in the kitchen, sweeping up in an apron. Sam in the bathroom, wrapped in a towel. Sam in his bed. Sam with a smile and Sam not dead. 

Of course she never smiled. He didn’t know if that ruined the illusions or made them better.

She’d phoned him. 

He’d just gotten up, too late and groggy. He’d only just poured his coffee. He left immediately upon seeing the familiar number in the log. He’d thrown on his jacket and boots. He probably hadn’t locked the door. The icy wind had licked against him and he couldn’t feel it. He knew, and told himself he didn’t, that he’d never make it in time. It was hours away.

She was always getting herself in trouble. She always had to do things alone. She could never accept help. She had found her father and she had gone to meet him and when he arrived she would be bleeding and dead.

He pushed the pedal down to the floor and his old blue truck spun out, slid and got him nowhere. The wheels spun in place. His heart jackhammered and finally it caught and he was off. He knew where she was. He knew because they had found the place together. If she had known what the place was there was no way she would have let him lay eyes on it. 

It was in the backcountry. Somewhere in the boreal forest among the tall pines. A small, compact little cabin of two rooms - a bed in one, in the other a sink. Coldness drafting in, which seemed somehow worse without the snow.

He could picture her there. The way she’d first looked. Her paleness and chapped lips. Even the scar across her eye, usually puckered and thick - an ugly reminder, seemed smooth and silver. Her hair and the soft scent mixing with crisp air. 

He cut the drive in half, but it wasn’t enough.

His truck barely made it. The brakes locked and the truck slid into a pile of snow, just an inch or two short of a great tree. He ripped open his door. There was no light. The sun was just setting and it was hard to see.

There were tracks in the snow. The door to the cabin was open. Her car was long cooled and parked. He stumbled in. And he could see her - just. 

It didn’t feel the way he thought it was supposed to feel. 

He picked her up and carried her outside. He wanted to see her face. It was hard though. She’d been gutted and he had to take care that nothing was going to spill out. Even her blood was cold. She was like marble, beautiful and pale in the moonlight. Otherworldly and untouchable. He put her down in the snow, rocked back on his heels.

He didn’t cry.

The other tracks - there were a few that weren’t hers - all indicated that they had left by the back way, behind the cabin and through the woods. He followed them. He knew what he was doing, and he did it without thought. Otherwise he couldn’t have done it.

He wasn’t sure which one was her father. Her sister was there though and that man - the one he hated more purely out of habit and no doubt the one who was most blameless in her death. There were two other men besides that. They were doing - _something_ \- and there was blood. He didn’t care to know. 

A flash of fire was born in the center. He grabbed the first one and smashed his fist across his face. He went down cold, the edge of his sleeve catching the fire. Everything happened so fast. He felled them one by one. The last one was Alexa, Sam’s sister, and she huddled towards a tree and looked up at him with big round eyes, pleading and for the breadth of a second he could see Sam. He was sick with it.

She burned screaming.

He had none of Sam’s love and none of her weakness.

He didn’t bury Sam in the snow and the cabin seemed too cruel, like a jail. She’d want to be out in the open beneath the sky and the stars. And her life was the same as her death - the animals would always get to her. Would always rip her apart with their teeth.

He was aware it should have been him. Out of all the animals and dark things, it should have been him to have got to her first. At least he would have been a merciful master.

~

He went back 

\- trudging heavy up the stairs. Numb and cold, bone deep and he was sure he wouldn’t know the shape of warmth, fists like ice -

and the coffee was still warm in the cup.

At his table was a woman. He could feel the evil from where he stood. He was too weary for it. She was dark in nature, and she wore Sam’s face. It was so far from what Sam really was that he could contemplate the trick without pain. It had her face and body - and it was nothing that resembled her in the slightest.

“Did you enjoy your trip?” it asked.

He drank the coffee and it scalded his throat.

“Didn’t you wonder how you got back without any gas in your tank? That was me. Not much of a talker are you? Are you going to thank me sweetie?”

She sat in a chair, leaning back, legs stretched languidly. He hated the sight. Ah, and there it was - the shift. There was something blackened in the intensity of it. It was like a skeleton, dipped in skinless flesh. It failed to arouse any interest in him at all. 

“None of us bothered to put on skin for Sam either, Legacy.”

He put his cup in the sink, or meant to, his hands seemed to tighten on their own and the cup shattered against the steel.

“Don’t make a mess now. I’m pleased with you. Four people, that’s a mighty nice offering.”

It wasn’t for you, he might have said if he cared enough to. It talked as if he was listening.

“Your coffee was fresh right? Do you want to know why?” It’s torn flesh moved deftly up into a stretched smile, “She’s alive but you’ll never get there in time. Unless I take you there.”

It was so hopeless he wanted to sob.

“Take me there.” was all he said.

It hissed, ugly and wretched, vulgar and permeating.

“Deal” it said. 

~

It was her last call. She was huddled behind her car, braced to stop her shivers. Forcing herself to relax into the bite of the cold. Something welled up in his throat and caught. Where there would have usually been annoyance or anger was relief. There had never been a more welcome sight in his life.

She flipped her phone down, frowning. A longing, something in her eyes, which turned to withdrawal and resignation. She straightened up and moved towards the cabin.

His vicious anger surprised even him, how easily the lingering sense of loss was to deny - ignore. How easily overcome with anger. Because he hadn’t answered the call, she meant to leave the world without ever speaking to him again. He moved silently and quickly but somehow she still turned too early. 

The unexpectedness of the event shocked her into compliance for an easy five seconds. He cursed himself for not taking advantage of those minute seconds but faced with the whole of her he found that even if he had tried - he knew he couldn’t have.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, stern and disapproving, shock evaporating like smoke, “You need to leave.”

“I’m not leaving without you.”

“This isn’t kid stuff.”

“Don’t you fucking do this to me - to yourself.” He was afraid his voice was quivering.

But it was too late. She always caught him off guard. The hit landed, but it wasn’t a knockout, it staggered him. And in the space of a minute she was in the cabin. 

He got there just as the knife plunged in. He managed to grab it and stop the downstroke, the blade cutting into the edge of his palm. The man whose grip had been severed glared at him coldly. Suddenly he could see the resemblance around the eyes. It had to be her father.

Sam shoved him towards the door ineffectually.

“Leave. Please go.” her voice studiously steady, a tremor emerging beneath it.

The others were there. 

“I’ll come back for you.” he spit at them as he picked Sam up, almost struggling, and carried her out the door.

He didn’t understand why they didn’t stop him, or knife him once his back was turned. Sam’s hand already reaching down to rest on the knife. She was already trying to escape his grasp, but weakly.

“If you try to pull that out Sam, I swear to God..”

He didn’t know what he would do. 

The door was open and he lay her in the passenger seat and fastened her seatbelt. Her eyes were glazed and looked so far into him he felt she could see his soul. It didn’t seem like a good sign.

He slowly backed her car out, avoiding any jostling or spinning. He tried not to look scared.

“There’s a town, maybe 30 kilometers back. It’s not that far Sam. They’ll have a hospital, you just need to relax. Talk to me, okay?”

“Why did you come?” she said slowly, “How did you know?” 

And it sounded like awe. She’d tipped over unevenly on her side to watch him. Her gaze burned. It was so far from normal he felt faintly nauseous.

“I know you Sam.” it was too much. Too much weight, too much conviction. Too much for Sam.

When finally - _finally_ \- they hit the highway with it's clean salted asphalt he floored it. He pulled up to the emergency room just as Sam slipped into unconsciousness.

He spent the rest of the night in an uncomfortable hard seated chair in the waiting room. They finally let him in her hospital room near dawn. He fell asleep at her bedside.

In the late morning when he awoke her eyes were already on him. When he met them she turned her gaze stubbornly away.

“What did you think you were doing?” she asked, voice low and there was something hurt about it. “Did you think you were helping me?”

“I know I was.” He passed his hand tiredly over his face.

She was silent and there was a stubborn set to her mouth. She looked tired though.

“Sleep.” He said.

She probably surprised even herself when she did.

As he sat there - beside her - dread finally began to creep in. He tried to stave it off by intertwining his shaking fingers with Sam's blessedly warm ones. It had to be enough for what was coming. 


	2. Chapter 2

When they'd first met, he'd been green and all things associated with it. New, Rich, drowning in covetousness.

He knew he had to come up with an explanation, of why he was out there, how he knew, how he found out and yet there was something darkly stubborn in him too. Even though she would ask it of him, he didn’t want to explain anything. Felt she didn’t deserve it because she would treat it like it was destiny - the right ending - that he’d impinged upon. There was still that small vicious anger in him that stirred in indignation. Only instead of the usual cause - of her damaged inability to let him in - it was driven by despair.

For the first time he wondered if he could ever truly reach her. He shook the thought off. She had enough doubt for the both of them and anyway it was already too late - he loved her. If they went down now, they were going together. 

He wanted to love her in ways she didn’t want to be loved. Every path, every consideration seemed0 to be the wrong way to go forward. Ever since he met her they always seemed to be going back.

A wetness on his hand surprised him. It took him a minute to realize he was crying. Once he started, he couldn’t seem to stop.

~

He was aware of her before they had actually met. After the first glance that was it. He seemed to be subconsciously monitoring her presence. A noticeable atmosphere change that defined her there and her not there.

He remembered thinking - not too kindly - that her scar was a shame. An ugly thing that unbalanced her eyes so that one seemed to be permanently heavy lidded. Her hair was darkish - brown and somehow when it caught the light it seemed red. Her thick, fine eyebrows - one bisected by the scar - and sooty eyelashes. Her red mouth and slender neck. He’d never planned on talking to her.

All he’d ever wanted was a woman who was sexy and confident. Someone he didn’t have to be ashamed of in the way his father was ashamed of his mother. He had wanted the whole package - beauty, brains, submission, and devotion. And was it really the crime Sam thought it was to want someone beautiful inside and out?

It was a University math class. It was the only class he was sure not to miss and she turned up religiously. Until one day she didn’t. When he saw her again, she was obviously hurt. There was a nasty bruise smacked across the left side of her face where her scar was. She moved gingerly and didn’t take notes. Her right hand wrapped in a bandage.

Idiot that he was, he thought he was doing a charitable deed when he decided to offer her his notes. 

He’d always been that way. Confident, both in himself and his ability. In his family’s wealth and the superiority of both education and popularity. He was firmly middle class, not unambitious but comfortable. He was well formed and handsome enough that he didn’t scare away the really pretty girls. 

He was not exactly casual, didn’t consider himself casual - more friendly and open. As were most of the women he went out with. He didn’t dislike any of them and there was usually little unpleasantness in any departure. He figured he would marry whoever he happened to be dating when he was more settled in life - old enough to have sampled the array of pleasures around him without regret. There was no meanness to the thought, more a generosity of spirit. Something he knew Sam would condemn. It had taken him a long time to understand why.

Maybe he was lost the moment he first spoke to her. Or maybe he’d always belonged to her.

“Hey, I noticed you weren’t in class. Would you like to use my notes?” he’d said.

She’d looked, calculated motives, and found herself unsure. She reluctantly accepted them when he placed them in her hands. He felt himself unnerved, withered by her gaze. She caught him staring at the scar.

“See you next week.” He’d said. She’d said nothing.

Consequently he could only blame himself for the tangle they were now in. She'd never invited any of it in the slightest.

~

After the police were satisfied, after the hospital was satisfied, they were allowed to leave. Sam couldn’t seem to meet his eyes. She let him lead her to the car and slid in the passenger seat without argument.

Their breath fogged the windows and they sat there in the cold. 

“You’re not going to argue with me.” He said.

Uncharacteristically she said nothing.

“You’re going to move in with me.” He said.

They drove and they stopped for gas and he bought her junk food and still, she said nothing.

“You drive me fucking crazy.” He said.

When he turned round to look at her she had pain on her face.

“I fucking love you.” He said.

~

For all the ways he'd imagined it - for all the ways he'd dreamed about it, in the end there wasn't much to mark it's passage.

Moving Sam into his house took one trip. She had even less than him. He forged her signature on the notice and dropped it off at the residence office. He settled her into his bed and made her tea. She seemed tiny. Her, in his bed.

He made her soup from a can and cleaned up the smashed cup in the sink.

He made himself go to class the next day because he felt he needed to stop looking at her all the time. She’d dropped out of University and had been working as a maid. He'd nearly wanted to follow. Their lives were too filled with aberrations - serious ones - that school seemed pedestrian by comparison. It began to look like a waste of his time in a way that he had neither felt nor considered before. It seemed like they were being drawn into a downward spiral. It was hard to imagine the future. 

When he returned she was in the kitchen, a chef’s apron tied around her. She seemed more herself and it relieved him. He wanted to kiss her, to wrap her in his love. A hunger pang shuddered inside him. How he yearned for her. And he wondered if it would hurt to try.

Everything seemed so wrong, felt so wrong. He knew it shouldn’t, hadn’t he recovered her? Wasn't that all that mattered?

He'd made a deal without knowing the terms. The details he couldn't guess but the broad strokes he knew. He just didn't think about them.

She glanced up at him. 

“You didn’t have a lot in your cupboard.”

He touched her shoulder, wondered if she would shake him off. She went still. 

“Don’t do this to me.” she said, voice weak.

And he found he couldn’t force the subject, not when she was so weak. She was making breakfast, toast and eggs - no butter. He'd meant to pick it up. Knew in his heart he was no longer a bachelor. Tried to pick out things she might like.

“Let me make the coffee” he said, changing the subject, reaching around her and up to get the coffee off the top shelf.

The sooner they talked about it the better. There were still threats out there, ones moving even in the daylight. These ones he acknowledged more seriously. They had uncovered something. No longer was Sam protected by the indifference of her abusers. No, now they would have no choice but to deal with her. Her interruption had forced their hand.

"Will the police call?"

All her pain, he thought, and she didn't even know how these things worked.

"Probably. One of them seemed quite taken with you."

They had said they would call when they had any information. But there would be none. The attack hadn't taken place where they'd said. The description was all wrong. And it was non-fatal. After a month or less it'd probably be a cold case. But that one officer....he expected the guy wanted to check up on her.

"Don't do this." she begged again, making him feel shame. Making him drop the subject immediately.

She hated that sort of thing. Hated to hear about it. He knew that. That she could be at all desirable - to anyone - left a bad taste in her mouth.

"How did you find me?" She asked. Almost accusatory. Definitely touched by some emotion hitherto unseen.

"I don't want to talk about it." He said stubbornly.

They were at an impasse.

"I was never the one with secrets." He intoned again. He let the words sit in the uncomfortable silence.

"You owe me an explanation." She impressed, "It's my life."

So final. Like she was an island, floating around in a sea of unconnected nothingness. Like her life, and subsequently her death, would affect no one. It made him angry, but he tried not to let it show.

"And I'm part of it. Now." He said instead, with a touch of finality.

She couldn't keep him pinned with her gaze then. No, she was the first to look away. He knew what he was doing, had thought it over. She didn't want to acknowledge any part of what he'd just said and so she wouldn't. She'd give up the conversation and her line of questioning just to be free of the thought of it. To be free of his concern. Of him, altogether, really.

"Have you been taking care of your stitches?" He followed up with.

"A lot longer than you have."

Through seasons. Through years.

It all might have been a touch more pleasant if he'd had an explanation ready. Instead he had to rely on the cheapest of his methods. It seemed she was relying on the cheapest of hers as well. It certainly felt that way.

"Was that him? The man that I saw?" He didn't think he'd need to clarify which one.

"...Yes."

He was going to kill him. But he didn't say that.

"Alexa was there." It had the pointed tone of an 'I told you so' which he wanted to regret but simply did not.

"I know that." She spit, mouth a grim line.

He swallowed. It wouldn't do to antagonize her. He was still reeling from a loss that hadn't happened and just the thought of it seemed to send him spiraling. Which wasn't her fault. A lot of things maybe were her fault, but not that.

"We should eat, food's getting cold."

~

They fell into the old pattern of researching without discussion. There was no talk of the cabin that night. Sam must have assumed that he knew what she knew. That he'd arrived at the cabin by way of the same conclusion. Which meant it was something in their previous research he'd missed.

It nagged at him. Another misstep like that and Sam really would be dead.

And then there was the fact that _he_ had returned. Her father.

Things were escalating to an unforetold degree.

He didn't feel ready for it. Sam herself, as always, was nothing but calm.

~

After the first night she'd stayed she had refused to sleep in the bed.

The significance wasn't lost on him.


End file.
